


Feelings, Laughter, and Cardio

by Rankaloid



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Confessions, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:40:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28280028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rankaloid/pseuds/Rankaloid
Summary: Kaito and Shuichi both have something to confess. Shuichi beats Kaito to the punch.
Relationships: Momota Kaito/Saihara Shuichi
Comments: 17
Kudos: 130





	Feelings, Laughter, and Cardio

**Author's Note:**

> my friend azu streamed ndrv3 for me and another friend and saimota hit me like an 18-wheeler with the brakes cut
> 
> thanks to [Psychiccupid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Psychiccupid/pseuds/Psychiccupid) for betaing this and generally being awesome and supportive! and thanks to azu for reading all my chaotic WIPs and joining me in saimota hell

"Yo, Shuichi!"

Shuichi stops in his tracks and looks over his shoulder, blinking a few times. He'd been wandering the east wing of the school for a little while now, pacing the hallways between the gym and Himiko's lab. On this stroll or any other, he'd never seen anyone here—and certainly the last person he'd expect to be off in some moody corner of the school is Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars, striding toward him briskly and confidently. Squares of pale, late-afternoon light from the windows dance along his coat as he walks, and the brilliant grin he fixes Shuichi with seems to sparkle like starlight even in the moody lighting.

"Oh! Hey, Kaito," Shuichi replies, face lighting up and posture straightening. That's the kind of effect Kaito has on him: instantly brightening, like a breath of fresh air, or a ray of sunshine on a cold day.

There was a point in time where Shuichi would've berated himself for having thoughts like that about his closest friend; by now, he's just accepted them as an unfortunate new feature of his life.

"Jeez, I've been looking for you everywhere," Kaito huffs. He comes within a few feet of Shuichi before he finally stops, raising an eyebrow at the detective. "What're you doing way on this side of the school?"

"Oh, sorry," Shuichi says, smile turning a bit sheepish. "I walk around the school sometimes, just to check if anything's changed. Plus, it's pretty quiet over here, so it gives me time to think."

"Oh! I'm not interrupting, right?" Kaito asks, head tilted innocently. "If I'm interrupting, I can always come back later."

"Er, ah," Shuichi stammers, stumbling around the phrase _I don't mind if it's_ you _interrupting_ as he tries to formulate a response. "N-No, not really. I was just about finished. What's up?"

"There's just something I wanted to talk to you about," Kaito says.

Despite the breezy tone of voice, Shuichi reads some tension into the way Kaito's shoulders are set and the way his lips are pulled just a bit too tight. His heart beats a bit faster, nervous.

"Umm, sure. Is something wrong?" he asks, frowning.

"No. Well, not exactly." Kaito frowns and scratches the back of his neck. "I've just got some things I might need to...get off my chest. Or talk through. Something like that."

The uncertainty in Kaito's voice piques Shuichi's interest. Kaito must notice the way his eyebrows raise, because his shoulders hunch up a bit and he averts his eyes to the side.

"I know, it's not really like me to be so..." Kaito waves his hands vaguely, as though that's supposed to mean anything. Shuichi fills in the blank himself: _Emotional. Weak. Unmanly_. "I'm just thinking...every day in here could be our last. So if I've got something on my mind..." He looks back at Shuichi, something intense and determined in his gaze. "I don't wanna die with any regrets."

"...I see." Shuichi's voice quiets as he mulls over the statement. "That's more pessimistic than I expected...but I feel the same way."

Well, he feels the same way in theory, anyway. He has one regret, one secret he's desperately keeping from Kaito—and hearing Kaito talk about regrets and dying with things unsaid now is bringing it to the surface, threatening to bubble up and out of his mouth.

"It's not pessimistic!" Kaito protests, because of course he would take that as an insult. "I wanna believe in everyone the way I believe in you and Maki Roll, but it feels like Monokuma's always got some damn trick up his sleeve to keep the killing game going."

"Right," Shuichi says. "As long as he's around, we're all still in danger..."

The two of them lapse into silence. Shuichi's mind wanders back to earlier: _I don't wanna die with any regrets._ Is that how it's going to feel, when he dies? Is the last thing on his mind going to be the things he never said?

"...You know, never mind," Kaito sighs. "We've got more important things to focus on, yeah?"

"I-I think if you want to talk about something, that's important, too," Shuichi protests. "Not everything has to be about the killing game."

"Eh, maybe some other time," Kaito says, and he waves his hand and grins dismissively. "Don't worry about it."

Something churns in Shuichi's gut. It's not like Kaito to suddenly need to speak to him; it's not like Kaito to try and open up at all. Maybe it's the frustration at seeing Kaito get so close to trusting Shuichi with something, then pull off; maybe it's the thoughts from earlier, about all the unspoken words that are going to die with Shuichi if someone decides to make him their target. Whatever it is, it's making something inside him finally bubble over.

"Wait, Kaito. I..." Shuichi swallows. "...What if I told you I...also had something I wanted to tell someone? And I'm afraid I'll regret the consequences of saying it, but I'll also...definitely regret not saying it?"

"What, like a secret or something?" Kaito's face lights up and his focus becomes absolute, as it always does when somebody asks for his help.

"Sure," Shuichi says weakly. Kaito's earnest enthusiasm to help hits Shuichi physically, with equal parts fluttery affection and nauseating guilt. _Would he still be this excited if he knew what he was helping me with?_

"Well, what kind of secret?"

"That's not important," Shuichi lies quickly, bald-faced. "It's just...a secret that might make things...weird, if I say it out loud."

"Huh." Kaito strokes his patch of facial hair with his thumb as he considers that. Shuichi had thought the goatee was ridiculous at first, but like most aspects of Kaito, it had become regrettably charming over time. "Well, if you're gonna have regrets either way, why not just say it?"

"Because the worst-case scenario if I do say it is worse than the worst-case scenario if I don't say it," Shuichi says, with the practiced phrasing of someone who's been repeating that very statement to himself for a while.

"What about the best-case scenario?" Kaito pitches.

"The best-case scenario...?" Shuichi pauses, thinking. "Well, that depends on whether we're talking about the realistic best-case scenario or the unrealistic—"

"Actually, you know what your problem is?" Kaito interrupts, eyebrows raised. "Your problem is you're overthinking this! If you've had time to think about all the possible consequences, you've had time to act and see what happens for yourself!"

"Th-That's...reckless," Shuichi manages to say, and it feels like an understatement.

He doesn't know what else he expected: Kaito is always charging into things head-first, brain-last. It's an alien concept to Shuichi, meticulous and trepidatious to a fault—but even if he hasn't fully embraced Kaito's life philosophy, there's something so freeing being _around_ it. Having Kaito by his side helps him act just a little bit recklessly, just a little bit impulsively, and it's...in so many ways, it's exactly what he's needed his entire...

"So?!" Kaito exclaims, and Shuichi abruptly remembers this is a conversation, and probably the wrong time to reflect fondly on Kaito. "You think I got to be Luminary of the Stars by being careful?! Hell no!" Kaito punches a fist into his open hand. "I chased what I wanted and didn't apologize for anything, to hell with the consequences!"

"That's not really the same thing," Shuichi retorts, voice rising in frustration. "What do you want me to do, just...blurt it out and see what happens?"

"It _is_ the same thing! It's about acting with conviction, like a man! Be honest with yourself about what you want and just say it!" Kaito grins in the most aggressive way imaginable and slaps his chest with his hand. "If you can't say it to the person you're thinking of, say it to me first!"

"That's not going to work," Shuichi says quickly, as vague as possible. If he tells Kaito _he's_ the one he's keeping a secret from, well—there's no way he's getting out of this hallway without getting a confession wrung out of him.

"Why not? What, you don't...trust me or something?" Kaito asks, a tiny bit of hurt creeping into his determined expression.

Shuichi's heart twists a little. "It's not that!" he protests.

"Then tell me!"

"I _can't_ ," Shuichi snaps, Kaito's red-hot passion unfortunately infectious. "I can't!"

" _Say it!_ "

"No!"

" _Shuichi—_ "

" _Fine!_ Kaito, I have feelings for you!" Shuichi blurts out.

The world freezes. So does Kaito's face, mid-sentence. Shuichi's words echo down the hall softly, and inside his own head _very_ loudly.

"Romantic feelings," Shuichi clarifies, because if he's going to dig his grave, he might as well go the full six feet. "That...was the secret."

Kaito still doesn't say anything, but his facial muscles remember how to move again; his mouth pops open in slack-jawed shock, and his eyes widen. It'd be comical, in literally any other situation.

"Huh," Kaito says finally. He swallows.

Shuichi waits. Kaito does not eludicate on his statement. Shuichi feels a single bead of sweat drip down his temple, heavy as lead. Finally, Kaito opens his mouth to speak, with the same expression of shock.

"Shuichi, you're..." Kaito's mouth moves around a few different words, then settles on: "You're a guy."

"Yes," Shuichi confirms, already feeling the deepest regret imaginable.

"And I'm a guy," Kaito says, with a questioning lift at the end, like he's suddenly not sure himself.

"Yes. We are both guys, Kaito," Shuichi says, slowly.

"...That's it? It's really that...simple to you?" Kaito asks. His shock has softened to something more like sad disbelief.

"Kaito, I...I don't understand what you're asking," Shuichi says, with full honesty. "But...we don't have to talk about this. If you don't feel the same way, we—"

"Whoa, hang on," Kaito says, and he grabs Shuichi's arm like he's going to try and escape. He puts his other hand to his own forehead, where he squeezes the bridge of his nose and pinches his eyes shut. "Can I have a second to think?"

"S-Sure," Shuichi says, bewildered not only by the request, but by the meek, confused tone Kaito offers it in. His hand, as always, feels radiantly warm, even through his jacket. He tries his best to not dwell on that.

Kaito's quiet for a few moments; so is Shuichi, even though his anxiety is building and he kind of wants to scream.

"Okay," Kaito says finally, bringing his hand down from his forehead (and not from Shuichi's arm, concerningly) and meeting Shuichi's eyes. His expression is earnest and questioning, not disgusted or angry, which lowers Shuichi's anxiety a single iota. "I'm confused."

"...Which part is confusing?" Shuichi hazards. He'd drawn up a few different scenarios for how this could go, most of them deeply optimistic fantasizing. "I'm confused" was not in any of them.

"I guess...the _us_ part?" Kaito says, biting his lip.

Shuichi's heart jumps at the word 'us.' Pavlov's gay feelings, he supposes.

"Right," Shuichi says. He has absolutely no idea what Kaito's talking about. "What...do you mean by that?"

"I just mean..." Kaito pauses a long moment, brows furrowed in genuinely deep thought. "Is this like dating a girl?"

"Kaito, _please_ tell me what you're trying to say," Shuichi begs, voice high and shaky with barely-contained anxiety. "I have _no idea_ what you're asking right now or why."

"Are you really gonna make me spell it out?" Kaito snaps. His face flushes a shade of red Shuichi's never seen on him before. "I-I'm asking what you think it'd be like if we dated! A-And why do you _think_ I'm asking that?!"

Lightning spikes through Shuichi's chest, so violent and sharp he feels like his heart's been pierced for a second. Then the shock fades, and a torrential rush of warmth replaces it—his heart won't stop pounding, palpitating, until even the tips of his fingers feel flushed and hot.

When he comes back into his own brain, slightly dazed and tingly all over, Kaito is still babbling nervously.

"Are you the girl, and I'm the guy? But I can't really think of you as a girl," Kaito continues. He rubs his temple with one hand and screws his eyes shut. "Then am _I_ the girl? Damn, this doesn't make any sense..."

 _I think the one not making sense is you,_ Shuichi thinks. _But what should I do? He looks like he's panicking...I'm not really sure what's going through his mind, but this must be a lot to process._

"Kaito," Shuichi says, in a voice he barely recognizes. Kaito stops talking and looks up, blinking.

"Maybe _you're_ overthinking this...?" Shuichi continues, tilting his head with a nervous smile.

Kaito blinks a few more times. He frowns. He presses his thumb to his lip and furrows his brow, pondering Shuichi's words deeply.

"You're right...I'm doing too much thinking with my head." He pounds his chest, then fixes Shuichi with a confident, pulse-spiking grin. "At times like these, a man has to listen to his heart."

 _What does that_ , Shuichi starts to think, and then Kaito clumsily crushes him into the wall with his mouth.

The kiss isn't bad, but it's far from perfect. The wall isn't exactly soft, and neither are Kaito's teeth, bruising against Shuichi's lips as Kaito tries to find the right angle. But it's warm and it's real and it's reckless and wild, all the things Shuichi had avoided his entire life and then gone and fallen so completely for, and it's just so unmistakably _Kaito_ in a way that makes Shuichi's heart soar into his throat.

Shuichi wraps his arms around Kaito's back and melts into the kiss, gently adjusting and correcting into something a bit more comfortable. Kaito makes an appreciative noise from the back of his throat. Warmth blooms in Shuichi's chest, and he thinks he could stay like this forever.

There's a small problem, though: he needs to breathe. By all indications of continued enthusiasm, Kaito doesn't.

Shuichi pushes against Kaito's shoulder. Kaito doesn't respond. Shuichi briefly entertains the possibility that this has been a murder plot all along. Lungs burning, he frantically pounds on Kaito's shoulder; Kaito finally pulls back, lips breaking apart with an embarrassing _pop_.

"What's up?" he asks, still only inches away. There's an open-mouthed, wide-eyed stupor to his expression, like he's just been snapped out of a trance. His pupils are dilated and unfocused; he seems more like he's talking _through_ Shuichi than _to_ him. Shuichi's eyes follow as he traces his thumb across his lower lip, in a motion too slow to be fully conscious.

"N-Need to...to breathe..." Shuichi wheezes. He attempts to lean forward, to double over onto his knees while he catches his breath. Kaito doesn't move, though, so Shuichi's head just lands on Kaito's chest. _Well, this works too_ , Shuichi thinks, and he leaves his forehead there in resignation.

"What, already?" Kaito asks, as though he's not also breathing a bit hard. He sounds a bit more cognizant now. "You need to work on your lung capacity. Hey, do you do cardio?"

"Is now...really the time to...ask that?" Shuichi groans, still taking deep, unsteady breaths directly into Kaito's shirt. Kaito smells like Old Spice aftershave. It's not bad, actually.

"Well, if we're gonna be doing this more, then..."

Kaito trails off. Shuichi pulls his head back and looks up to find Kaito rubbing the back of his head, grinning sheepishly.

"...We are, right?" Shuichi catches the color rising in Kaito's cheeks, betraying his disarming smile. "Gonna be doing this more, I mean."

 _Doing this more_ hadn't occurred to Shuichi. He'd barely had time to think (or breathe) since Kaito's chaotic mess of a confession. Now, the reality of it is sinking in.

"Well, that's...not something I can decide for you," Shuichi says, half-laughing in a nervous titter. "But...if you want to—"

"Hell yeah I want to!" Kaito interrupts. "Seriously, you're..."

Kaito hesitates. The blush on his face starts to creep down his neck. Shuichi watches, mesmerized, as Kaito's foolhardy, self-assured confidence melts into nothing.

"I mean...you know! You're really...y-you're really..." Kaito clears his throat awkwardly. "Damn. You know, never mind. This kind of stuff isn't really my—"

"I-I like you a lot, Kaito," Shuichi cuts in.

"...Huh?"

"I like you a lot," Shuichi repeats, as though there were any possibility Kaito had misheard him. "When I say it that way, it sounds almost childish, but I really mean it. When I was as scared and alone as I'd ever been, you were there for me. You supported me, and filled me with the confidence I needed. After being shown that sort of kindness...it was almost impossible _not_ to fall for you..."

"Shuichi..." Kaito replies, voice uncharacteristically hushed. "...I'm glad that meant so much to you, but seriously, it's not a huge deal. You just needed a nudge in the right—"

"Hang on. I have more to say," Shuichi interrupts, and Kaito's mouth snaps shut with a look of surprise. "You've done so much for me...but it's more than that, actually. Even if you hadn't, I still just like...being near you. Listening to you. I've never been around anyone so relaxed...and impulsive. You make me laugh, and you make me feel at ease, in a way I've never felt before. Maybe...you're exactly what I've been missing, all this time."

Shuichi sighs, smiling wistfully. Then, compelled by a boldness he didn't know he had, he grabs Kaito's hand in both of his and holds it between them, turning his smile up to meet Kaito's eyes.

"So...you don't have to be embarrassed to say how you feel, Kaito. After all, it's not like you could get much more embarrassing than what I..."

Shuichi trails off. Kaito is staring at him, wide-eyed shock turning to furrowed, nervous contemplation.

"...You've...been really quiet," Shuichi says. His heart races, and the gears in his head spin uncontrollably. His confident grip on Kaito's hand slackens. "W-Was that...maybe...too much...?"

"Ah, no," Kaito stutters. He brings the hand not currently in Shuichi's up to rub the back of his neck again, and he averts his eyes toward the wall nervously. "You're just...a lot more confident than I imagined you'd be."

 _You're a little less confident than I imagined you'd be_ , Shuichi almost says, before his brain fully registers what Kaito has said.

"...You've imagined it?" Shuichi echoes blankly.

"H-Hey! Don't get caught up on the little details, alright?! Sheesh!" Kaito holds his hands up defensively, redder than Shuichi's _ever_ seen him. "What, like it's not normal for a man to have flights of fancy sometimes?!"

"I didn't s _mmph_ ," Shuichi says, as Kaito's hand clamps over his mouth. Shuichi's eyebrows furrow in a disbelieving, adorable pout. He files away the thought _Kaito fantasized about me in some capacity_ to be considered later, most likely while lying awake and staring wide-eyed at the ceiling.

"...So you want me to say how I feel, huh," Kaito says.

Shuichi, robbed of the ability to offer a shyer _it'd be nice_ or _only if you want to_ , just nods. At least some of what Kaito feels for him is obvious (he wants to kiss him, for one; _fantastic_ start), but it'd be nice to hear those words from Kaito's own lips.

Kaito finally takes his hand off Shuichi's mouth, placing it instead on Shuichi's shoulder. He gives it a reassuring squeeze; Shuichi suspects he's not the one Kaito's trying to reassure.

"Okay. Well. I guess you're...important to me. And..."

Kaito's mouth opens and closes a few times. Shuichi waits patiently.

"This is _hard_ ," Kaito says, like he's having a revelation. "How'd you make this look so easy?"

"I wouldn't say it was easy. Just relax, maybe?" Shuichi offers, along with a nervous smile. "It's only me."

" _Only_ you?" Kaito echoes disbelievingly. "You're the guy whose opinion matters the _most_ to me."

Shuichi doesn't know why _that's_ the sentence that's made him blush the hardest so far, but he can feel his ears turning red. Kaito seems a bit taken aback by it, too; he blinks and bites his lip, like he wasn't expecting himself to say something like that.

"O-Oh, I, uhh...thanks?"

"...I have a lot more I wanna say to you," Kaito continues, frowning thoughtfully. "But...I just can't put it all into words yet..."

 _Unsurprising_ , Shuichi thinks. All of Shuichi's feelings go straight from his heart to his brain, where he analyzes and categorizes and picks them apart until he's almost sick of having them. Kaito's seem to come straight from his heart with no pit stops, bypassing the exhausting waterwheel of anxiety so familiar to Shuichi. Of course he doesn't have words for what he's feeling.

"It's okay," Shuichi decides. "I think...I already understand how you feel about me."

"No, jeez," Kaito scoffs. "Now that you've bared your soul to me, I'm gonna feel bad if all I can say is 'you're important.' That was true even before!" Kaito almost looks like he's pouting. Like this is Shuichi's fault for putting him in this position, somehow.

"That's not...how I meant to make you feel," Shuichi stutters, feeling guilty. "If you really can't do it, it's—"

"What do you mean _can't_?!" Kaito bursts out, offended. "Of course I can! I'm just...saving it, for a special occasion!"

"Oh, a special...occasion?" Shuichi echoes, trying in vain to pretend like he knows what Kaito's talking about.

"Yeah! Like...Valentine's Day, or an anniversary, or..."

_You're going to wait until our anniversary to tell me how you feel about me?!_

"Wait, come on, don't look at me like that," Kaito sputters. "I-It'll be sooner than that! And it'll be amazing. You'll see!"

Shuichi sighs, soft but long-suffering. Then, shaking his head in disbelief, he laughs, small but genuine. What else could he have expected from a confession involving Kaito, really? It's unscripted, imperfect, messy, unpredictable, following not just Kaito's impulses, but his own, too. Would the old Shuichi Saihara have just blurted out his feelings like that on a passionate whim? He doubts it.

"Right! Your laugh," Kaito says suddenly, expression lighting up. "I like your laugh. It's cute!"

"I-It's...?" Shuichi stammers, face turning shocked and molten red.

"Cute!" Kaito repeats, smiling brightly. "...Uhh, sorry. I guess that's not a very manly compliment."

"I-I don't mind," Shuichi manages, because _hearing you call my laugh cute made me so happy I wanted to die for a second_ is more than he's capable of saying while his heart's still beating out of his chest.

"So, what do you think of mine?"

"Your what?" Shuichi responds blankly, still coming to his senses.

"My laugh," Kaito clarifies. "I'll try not to get offended if you say it's 'cute.'"

"Y-Your laugh..." Shuichi furrows his brows, leans back into the wall, and puts a hand up to his chin as he considers the question. He tries to replay every relevant memory he can conjure, every fit of boisterous laughter and every small chuckle.

"Hey, don't strain yourself or anything," Kaito says, waving a hand dismissively. "It was just a joke, anyway. You don't have to—"

"It's like a sunbeam," Shuichi says, still in his deep thinking pose.

"It's...wait, it's like a _what?_ " Kaito responds, baffled.

"I guess...it's warm, but not...intense or overwhelming. Hearing it...fills me with this gentle, comforting warmth, like being enveloped in sunlight. It makes me feel happy and safe. I think...it might be one of my favorite things about you..."

Shuichi trails off, slowly exiting his own mind and coming back to reality. There, Kaito is staring at him, open-mouthed, red-faced, and _mortally_ offended.

"Y-You're...are you trying to make me _look_ bad?!"

"No?!" Shuichi sputters. "Kaito, this isn't a competition!"

"The hell it's _not_ if you're gonna upstage me like that!" Kaito jabs a finger almost into Shuichi's chest, eyes fiery with determination. "Just you wait, sidekick! Tomorrow night, when we meet up for training, I'm going to wax poetic about your laugh! Count on it!"

 _That's...probably going to be embarrassing for both of us_ , Shuichi thinks. _But, still..._

"I...think I'm looking forward to that, weirdly enough," Shuichi says, with a small smile.

"You'd _better_ be!" Kaito shoots back.

And standing there, with the dappled light behind him fading to pale orange, Shuichi thinks...the grin on his face could probably light up the galaxy.


End file.
